


Best Stranded Good Ever

by Chelidona (Hobbity)



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)
Genre: Fluff, Fíli finds something on his beach, M/M, SpringFRE 2016, mer!kili, not quite what he was expecting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-25
Updated: 2016-04-25
Packaged: 2018-06-04 12:16:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6657403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hobbity/pseuds/Chelidona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a fill for the SpringFRE on tumblr, for prompt #1: I  thought I’d take a stroll along the beach after the storm. The last thing I expected to see in a the net was you!  </p><p>Fíli inspects his pasture near the beach after a storm and gets the best suprise of his life tangled in a fisherman's net.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Best Stranded Good Ever

**Author's Note:**

> As mentioned in the summary, a fill for the SpringFRE. I wrote that in one evening, so ... well. It was inspired by the Baltic Sea in Northern Germany. Hope you enjoy this little bit of fluff.

“Looks like the worst is over.”

Fíli looked up from his steaming mug and out of the window. His mother was right, the storm had abated. The old, diseased apple tree would live to see another storm. It yielded Fíli’s favourite apples so he was grateful for that. The sky was blue once more, but the wind was still strong.

Fíli had always loved the wind. Especially here, near the coast, where the wind tasted like salt. He loved getting his hair tangled, not matter how hard it was to get it decent again later.

He downed the last of his tea and coughed. Bad idea to do that with a hot drink.

“I’m going to take a walk,” he informed his mother as soon as he had recovered. “You know, check if anything was damaged and stuff.”

“Sure, darling.”

His mother winked. She didn’t buy it, of course; Fíli always made himself useful to his uncle on their farm, but he also just loved to go for a walk when it was windy.

He put on his sturdiest boots and jacket. It was early July, but when the wind came from the North, as it did today, it was still cold.

 

Fíli cursed when he spotted the net on their little private beach. Really, those fishermen should be more careful with their nets, this wasn’t the first time one of the nets littered the shore of their property and those things were heavy. But knowing how stupid cows were, they would manage to tangle their feet and break a leg.

When he came closer, he noticed that there was something still moving in the net. Fíli checked his pockets for a knife. Although the size of the thing made him feel a bit queasy; it seemed to be a porpoise and Fíli had never been all right with killing large animals.

 

The thing was trashing and – were those sharp teeth gnawing at the net? What … there were no animals like this in the Baltic Sea, Fíli was sure of that. Then he saw a hand tugging at the net from the inside. A human?

“Hello?” He asked tentatively. The trashing stopped abruptly.

“Hi …” The voice sounded eerily familiar.

“Um … are you all right?”

He heard the thing taking a deep, ragged breath.

“What does it look like, you clown?” Very familiar if a bit roughened. Fíli came a bit closer, knife in hand.

“Um … if I cut you loose … will you attack me?”

There was a pause.

“Would I tell you? But, no.”

“All right.”

He could hardly leave any sentient being like this. Fíli knelt down on the wet sand and took a closer look.

That thing should not exist. It was the stuff of silly legends. Maybe he was actually still in his bed, dreaming. But there was no denying that what he saw was a merman, with a nylon net wrapped tightly around it’s torso and the upper part of what was clearly a fishtail. The enormous fin was still laying in the water.

“Right.” He took his knife. “Hold still.”

The merman obeyed. Somehow Fíli would have been more comfortable with some resistance. But he began to diligently cut the ropes. The damn nylon wasn’t made to be cut quickly. More than once, the knife slipped and he nearly cut himself or into the stranger. He tried to pull at the ropes, which caused the merman to groan in pain. Not a good idea then.

Fíli was covered in a thin sheet of sweat by the time he untangled the last bit from the head of the merman. The more he worked, the more that slim, but finely muscled torso and that chocolate mess of curls seemed uncannily familiar.

His hands stilled. The merman, who looked exactly like his roommate at University, slipped out of the remaining net. He had Kíli’s awkward grin as he pushed himself up into a sitting position.

“Hi Fíli?”

Fíli blinked.

“ **Kíli**?” he asked.

“Hi.” The brunet gave an awkward wave.

“You can’t be Kíli. But you …. How do you know my name? What … How …”

A cool, salty hand covered his mouth.

“You’re babbling, Fíli.”

“Sorry.” The apology came from his internal autopilot, before Fíli’s brain caught up with the situation again.

“ **KILI**?”

“Yes.” The other – student? Merman? – scratched his head. “Good to see you.”

“I ….” Fíli opened his mouth and closed it. Then he said. “What the fuck?” That seemed the only sentence to encapsulate the range of his emotions.

“I omitted a few things when I talked about home,” Kíli said, as if this was an entirely normal situation. They sat on the beach, which was part of Fíli’s family farm, after a storm, after Fíli had just rescued Kíli, sporting a very noticeable fishtail.

“A few things? Kíli, you ….”

“I was born near a small island!” Kíli defended himself. “Just not … _on_ the island. But … well, I did go to school there, like I said.”

“But you are … I mean you’re not … are you human? What …” He pointed at the tail.

“I’m not. Obviously.” Kíli lifted his tail and beat against the sand a few times. It seemed playful. Knowing Kíli, he tried to lighten the mood. Not that Fíli knew anything about Kíli. Obviously.

“So what are you? Why … what the fuck are you even doing HERE?”

A small blush coloured Kíli’s cheeks.

“I’m a merman.”

That really didn’t explain much. Fíli tried again.

“I thought you wanted to go home for the holidays?”

“I was home,” Kíli defended himself, but blushed harder. Then he bent down to scratch his tail, where the net had dislodged his scales. “All right, this is not going to get more embarrassing anyway. Actually, I wanted to check on you. You told me where your home is, it’s not too far from mine, just a few hours swimming, and so I thought I take a look, maybe, you know, get on land, and surprise you?”

“Well, you did.” This was so much like Kíli that Fíli felt a bit more comfortable again. A bit. “Hang on … you wanted to surprise me naked?”

Kíli laughed. As beautifully as always. “Technically, I’m naked now.”

“Yes, but … I mean …”

Fíli looked away from Kíli’s tail. It seemed indecent all of the sudden.

“I had a bag. With clothes.” Kíli’s face fell. “I lost it when I got entangled in that stupid net. That normally never happens, I was just too cocky, I thought I could make it to the shore before the storm hit, but that was obviously wrong.”

“Yes.” No that he was over the initial shock, Fíli looked more closely at his flatmate. He seemed pale and angry red stripes covered his torso. “You don’t look well.”

Kíli grimaced. “I was stuck in a net, tossed around in the water and then thrown onto the shore, and then I was laying there panicking.”

“So ….” This was way out of any human’s depth. “Um, what are we going to do now? You can’t swim back like this. Can you … I mean how do you even change? I mean … you did have legs back at university.”

“Give it a few moments.” Kíli shook his tail. “I have to wait until the tail is a bit more dry to change. But then I’m naked.”

“Right. I … um …. I have to finish my inspection anyway, I’ll see if your bag washed up? Wait for me?”

“Sure.”

 

Fíli wasn’t too sure the brunet would wait for him to come back. His mind was still spinning. Kíli was a merman! But while part of his mind was busy freaking out over this turn of events, another part was diligently checking on the fence and the shoreline, scanning for damage or more debris. This was routine. And indeed, when he was nearly at the end of their property, he found a backpack he recognized as Kíli’s. There was also the branch of an old hazelnut tree that had broken off and damaged part of the fence. He made a mental note to repair it the next day.

 

When he returned, the merman was still sitting on the beach, but Fíli noticed that he had moved slightly, so the reed shielded him from curious looks should any boat happen to come by. The brunet was overjoyed when he saw the bag in Fíli’s hand. The coo was absolutely not human. Still, the smile was Kíli’s and the haste and clumsiness with which he opened it was familiar too.

To the blonde’s amazement, the clothes inside were dry. Kíli just shrugged when he saw Fíli’s face. An impish grin spread across the merman’s face and Fíli noticed the absence of fangs. He let his eyes trail further down, eeped and spun around. In the space of a second the tail had vanished and Kíli was sitting butt-naked on the sand. The brunet burst out laughing. That was familiar too.

“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” he teased.

Fíli felt a flush warming up his cold cheeks. Of all the times to bring up their drunken fumble right before they both left for home.

“Do we need to bring that up now?”

He had made out with a mer. Scratch that. He had had a crush on a non-human being for a year now.

“Was it …. Are you feeling that terrible about it?”

The pain he heard in Kíli’s voice made him turn around again. And there, standing in front of him, was his roommate. His Kíli. He was wearing a pair of black shorts and a yellow shirt. But his large eyes shone with sadness and his brows were slanted down. Fíli cursed himself for his thoughts. He might not understand anything, but he never wanted to hurt Kíli.

“No,” he murmured. That didn’t convince Kíli.

“So … did you regret what happened before you knew what I was or only now?”

“I … don’t.”

“You left before I woke up,” Kíli accused him.

“I tried to wake you up!” Fíli protested. “But then I had to go because my train left, and I knew you left only the day after so …”

“You could have messaged me.”

“I could say the same about you.”

They looked at each other. Kíli was drawing small circles in the sand with his toes.

“Yea. But instead I swam four hours to talk to you.”

That made Fíli smile. He curled his hand around Kíli’s upper arm. Underneath the t-shirt, it still felt cold.

“Will you stay?”

Kíli beamed and made a tiny stepped forward. “If you want me to.”

It was still very confusing. But all Fíli felt as he caught Kíli’s lips in a kiss was giddy happiness.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed it, a comment would make my day :) (here or on [tumblr](http://chelidona.tumblr.com))


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